


A quiet evening at Bobby’s.

by sasha_dragon



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-20
Updated: 2013-07-20
Packaged: 2017-12-20 20:41:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/891625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sasha_dragon/pseuds/sasha_dragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bobby was having a relaxing evening, building his panic room, when the Winchesters come knocking at his door. As he helps Sam patch Dean up, he wonders when Dean will ever figure out that he’s not bulletproof, the damn idjit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A quiet evening at Bobby’s.

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Again I stood at the crossroads and the demon looked at me and said, “Look, you can’t have ‘em they belong to Kripke, and he drives a harder bargain than I do. Now for the last time, bugger off, and leave Jared and Jensen alone as well while you’re at it.” As you can see I do not own Sam and Dean Winchester, and for that Dean will be eternally grateful  
> Notes: By rights I should be torturing Dean for my spn_gen_bigbang, but I thought, ahh I’ll leave the poor boy alone for a day. Then I remembered I’d signed up for A Dean-focused h/c Tags Challenge, on hoodie_time. Being somewhat of a git towards Dean, I wrote this as my response to my challenge. My words included gunshot wound, and it was a case of I’m so sorry Dean but you’re just so pretty when you bleed. As always my thanks go out tobigj52, a beta of great distinction, and with the patience of a saint. This is set sometime during season two. Feedback always welcome.
> 
> First posted to Live Journal August 2011

  
  
  
“Alright, Godamnit!! Stop hammering on my damn door, will ya. I ain’t gonna git there any faster the louder you hit it.” Bobby Singer yelled, as he made his way back up from the basement, where he was working on his latest project. A demon proof panic room. He was wiping his hands on a rag, and the sounds of someone assaulting his door were becoming if possible, increasingly frantic.  
  
“Listen, if you’re really persistent Jehovah’s witnesses, I got me a shotgun and I ain’t afraid to fill ya full of shot.” He got closer and he saw his door shuddering under the assault of what sounded like boot-clad feet. Bobby reached the door and opened it, ready to bitch out whichever dumb ass hunter was attacking his woodwork. After all the only people who knocked like that were hunters or the Winchesters if they needed help. That thought removed the smile from his face. Shit, no. Please let it just be an idjit hunter and not a Winchester special guest appearance.  
  
He took a breath and opened the door and his heart nearly stopped. Standing on his doorstep were Sam and Dean...no, scratch that. Sam was standing, and Dean was slumped against him, bleeding from...well, hell, just bleeding from everywhere. Sam’s eyes were wild with fear, and Dean’s head was lolling against his little brother’s neck. Before Sam could open his mouth, Dean opened half-lidded eyes and gave Bobby a dopey pain-filled smile. “Hey ya, Bobby, don’t bother with the whole filling me full of shot... been there, done that and it ruined my T- shirt. Can we come in?” The words were slurred, but Bobby got the gist of what Dean said. He quickly reached out to help steady Dean, as Sam moved forward.  
  
“What the name of all that is unholy did you do this time, Winchester?” The question was aimed at Dean, if only to keep him awake and focused.  
  
Dean managed to roll his way too heavy head back towards Bobby, “Had a little run-in with Frankenkitty. Hey, Sammy, are you alright?” Dean swung back to face his little brother, his face filled with concern.  
  
Sam was beginning to sag under the weight of his brother. He may not have been as tall as him, but Dean was all muscle despite his diet. Bobby got the other side, and took some of the weight off Sam. As he did he looked at the younger Winchester. He too was covered in blood, sadly most of it was Dean’s. But Bobby could see that Sam was injured too, his shirt was torn and he was bleeding.  
  
“For the last damn time, Dean, I’m fine - the damn thing just clawed me. You’re the one who got the shotgun blast, remember? You know, all that blood you’re leaking all over Bobby’s carpet. Now shut up, and help me get your heavy ass up to Bobby’s spare room.” Sam’s tone was waspish, but Bobby knew that was due to Sam’s terror at the state his big brother was in. Bobby just walked them towards the stairs. He looked up, and wondered just how the three of them were going to get up there. Then Sam stood up straighter and his face was set with determination. Bobby realized that Sam would be the one getting Dean upstairs and he went ahead.  
  
“Ok son, I’ll get up there and start setting up. What did you give him? Because, by the looks of him I don’t think I can give him anything else to help with the pain for a while.” Bobby was already two steps up as he spoke; he cast a look over his shoulder.  
  
Sam looked stricken at that news, but hey, Winchester luck had struck again. He’d already had enough of that today, “Vicodin, washed down with a hell of lot of whisky. God, I should’ve thought. Are you sure there’s nothing you can give him?” Sam’s face filled with guilt, and there was the start of what Dean liked to call a Samantha emo meltdown.  
  
Bobby had to stop that before Sam went into a full-on brood. He needed the kid to help him, and not sitting crooning at his brother while holding his hand, weeping. That wouldn’t help. Well, not until Bobby had finished patching the damn fool up. “Sam, we don’t have time for this. Now get him upstairs, and you can tell me what the hell a Frankenkitty is, while I’m patching you up.”  
  
Sam looked as if he was going to argue, then Dean moaned in pain and his face contorted. Then as usual, Dean let his game face slip back into place, and tried to climb the stairs. “Oh no, you don’t. Bobby, we got to see to Dean. You can take care of me later.” Sam looked at his brother, deciding whether it would hurt more to just pick Dean up in a fireman’s lift and get upstairs quickly, or let the stubborn idiot try and walk up there. Dean had successfully made it up one step with Sam’s support, but he was breathing heavily and leaning more of his weight against Sam.  
  
“Come on, Francis. We ain’t got all day. And Bobby wants to hear all about your heroic battle with the hellcat. You should’ve have seen him Bobby, he was amazing. He took out the savage beast. Shame we both missed the owner.” Dean tilted his head back and smiled at Bobby as he dragged himself up another step. Then he swayed backward and his eyes rolled back in his head, finally crumpling against his brother.  
  
“Finally. Ok, Dean, looks like we’re doing this my way.” Sam slipped his arm behind Dean’s knees and pulled him to his chest. He looked at his brother’s pale face and gave a pained smile. “Damn shame I can’t take a picture of you laying in my arms like this, the blackmail material is just pure gold.” Sam nodded to Bobby who walked upstairs. He slowly climbed the stairs behind him, being extra careful of the precious cargo in his arms.  
  
When he reached the bedroom Bobby had already covered the bed in an old sheet, and was laying out the items he’d need from an impressive med kit. Sam put Dean down gently and managed to get Dean’s jacket off by rolling him and easing the material off his body. He was just getting ready to take the rest of his clothes off, when Bobby touched his arm.  
  
“We need to take care of you now, Sam; I’ve still got some of your shirts here from the last little visit. I have to say after Dean’s little experience with Salmonella, the linen off the bed was never the same. I had to salt and burn it to make sure it was gone.” Sam glared at Bobby, his face set in a stubborn scowl. Bobby sighed. One day these two knuckleheads would drive him to murder. He looked at Sam with his best don’t mess with me, boy glint in his eye. Which Sam promptly ignored.  
  
  
“Look, Bobby, I’m fine. We need to take care of Dean now. He’s been shot, in case you hadn’t noticed.” Sam was sounding mutinous. Bobby just ignored him, turned round to the dressing table and poured a generous measure of holy water into a bowl along with peroxide.  
  
He turned back to face Sam. “Ok, why don’t you grab a quick shower, and clean up? Then I can patch you up. Dean will be fine for a few minutes; besides, Sam, do you really need to make matters worse for your brother by bleeding all over him? I don’t know what you two faced down. Dean don’t need some damn demonic infection, on top of everything else. Does he, son?” Bobby’s tone was stern and willing to back down to Sam.  
  
He understood Sam’s need to take care of Dean, but until he knew what they were up against, Dean was better off waiting. When Sam had laid him on the bed, Bobby had taken a quick look. Dean was a damn mess but he’d been lucky. Only Dean ‘nine lives’ Winchester could get blasted by a shotgun and still manage to keep on going. It looked as if it had peppered him with buckshot. But it seemed that the damage was mostly superficial, in that no major organs were involved. So for now Dean could sleep the sleep of the utterly stoned, while Bobby cleaned Sam up. And got the story of what happened out of him.  
  
Sam surrendered and left the room. He knew the young man would be on his best behaviour for Dean’s sake. Then Bobby heard the shower. While Sam took what would probably be the quickest shower on record, he moved towards Dean. He looked down into the pale face. Dean was sleeping but Bobby could see the pain he was still in the way his eyebrows were drawn together. His full lips were swollen from where he’d bitten them to keep the pain locked away. “What did you do this time, Dean? Step in front of a damn shotgun to save Sam? Come on, let’s take a little look.” Bobby picked up a knife and cut off his shirts with a practiced ease. Bobby was used to patching hunters up, but it never got any easier, especially when it involved the Winchesters.  
  
Too many times they had turned up at his door with one or the other bleeding. He’d seen John sat by the bedside of a much younger Dean. Praying his son would live until morning. He’d watched Dean taking care of Sam, while he’d had been out of his mind with fever from a witch’s spell. And too damn many times he’d watched Sam sit by Dean, talking to his brother, begging him not to go and leave him here alone. Too often it had been Dean’s blood he’d washed out of bedclothes, and wiped off floors and here he was again, “Son, you’re making an old man out of me. Why don’t you surprise me for once and just drop by for a beer.” Bobby looked at the now revealed body after he stripped the ruined shirts off and he swore softly. Dean’s left side was liberally sprinkled with shot. The wounds were oozing blood rather than gushing, and he thought they didn’t seem to be too deep. It looked as though Dean had been moving when he was hit, from the spread of lead shot; it went from his shoulder almost to his knee. Goddamn, this was not going to be a fun evening, yanking them out.  
  
“What do you mean, I’m making an old man out of ya? You’re already old. And knock off the perving at me. I know I’m hot but you’re freaking me out here with all that staring. But if you buy me a beer or three, I’ll think about letting you strip me without a fight.” Dean’s spoke slowly, and smirked up at Bobby.  
  
Bobby smiled at the young man, “Sorry, you ain’t my type, Dean. You might have girly lips and eyelashes but ya boobs ain’t big enough for me. You lie here quiet, while I take care of your brother, alright?” Dean nodded and once again his eyes closed. Bobby covered Dean with another sheet, and turned away just in time to see Sam standing in the room.  
  
He was still damp from his shower, wearing clean jeans and carrying a fresh shirt. His bare chest had several deep scratches across it, and there were scratches down his arms. Bobby whistled and winced in sympathy. “I take it those are souvenirs from Frakenkitty. Come on, Sam, let’s get this done and we can take care of Batman over there. I keep telling him, just ‘cause he thinks he’s bulletproof don’t mean he is.”  
  
Sam sat down on a chair by the bed and let Bobby get to work, hissing as the peroxide and holy water came into contact with his skin, bubbling and fizzing. Bobby flinched a little as he cleaned the scratches; Sam was sitting there quietly enduring the clean-up. All the while his eyes never left his brother. He needed to get Sam talking; it did no good to let Sam brood for too long. And he didn’t have Dean’s talent for goading Sam into reacting; it looked like it was going to be the old-fashioned way.  
  
“Well, then, what happened? Come on, Sam, I need to know why you look like you’ve tackled Freddy Kruger, and Dean looks like someone used him for target practice. Sam squirmed as his injuries stung as Bobby worked on them.  
  
“We’d just finished a salt and burn, and we were passing through a few towns over. We were on our way here to see you. I wanted to get hold of some lore on Banshees. Dean had suggested we stop here and pick your brains. Well, as I said we stopped in a town not too far away; we were in the diner having something to eat. There were some kids talking, and they were all going on about the freak’s cat.” Sam paused checking on his brother then he carried on.  
  
“As I was saying, the freak’s cat...you know the story, Bobby. There’s always one kid whose life is made a complete misery by the jerks in town. In this case it was a girl who lives outside of town on her parent’s farm. Nothing sinister, so we thought. The usual story - because she likes to read and pay attention in class, the town kids call her freak. God, do I know how that feels. The charming little brats decided to have some fun. They’d go over to the farm at night and roar round the farmyard in their cars.”  
  
“One night they ran over the girl’s cat and killed it. Now that should be the end of the story, right? Only it wasn’t. These kids were scared, Bobby, I mean, really scared. After about a week, there had been strange sightings round the town - a cat. According to the kids this thing is bigger and meaner than your average pet, and there had been a rash of attacks on animals. The ring leader’s dog, a Doberman, had literally been torn to pieces. Now they were saying the cat was following them, watching them. Plus the night before, one of the other guys in the car had been out running when he’d been attacked. From what we heard the guy had been shredded. We’re talking over a hundred stitches; the sheriff even thought it was a mountain lion. But the kids were swearing it was the freak’s cat.”  
  
Dean stirred and Sam went to get up but Bobby put his hand on Sam’s arm, “Nearly done, Sam. Let me bandage your arms. What did you and Dean do?” Bobby waited as Sam settled down again.  
  
“We waited for the kids to leave and asked a few questions of our own. It didn’t take long to figure it out. It turns out that for once the kids were right. It seems the whole family had connections with a local legend. The farm was built on the sight of a witches’ meeting place, and the families that lived there were descendants of a local coven. Or as Dean put it. ‘Great! Sabrina the Teenage Witch has gotten hold of a copy ‘Pet Cemetery’. And she’s been using it as an instruction manual. One of these days I swear I’m gonna hunt Stephen King down and smack him silly. ” Sam stopped talking, and Bobby finished up with the bandaging. He tapped Sam on the shoulder, and waited for him to put his shirt on.  
  
Once Sam was dressed they moved towards the bed. Bobby looked at the sleeping figure laying on it. He pulled back the sheet then rolled up his sleeves, “Ok, before you tell me the rest, we need to cut the rest of his clothes off. Then get ready for the fun part of tonight’s entertainment. Pellet fishing.” Sam shuddered at the thought of that.  
  
Bobby picked up his scissors, then swiftly ran the blades up the length of Dean’s jeans. He passed them to Sam who did the same on the other side. They heard a groan and stopped. Sam moved level with Dean’s face, reached out and brushed at his sweat soaked hair. “Hey, man, you ok? Do you need us to stop. Where are you hurting?” Sam’s voice was filled with worry, and Dean opened his eyes and looked up at his brother.  
  
“Of course it frickin’ hurts. Those were my favourite jeans. Why’d you have to cut em off?” Dean managed a weak smile.  
  
Sam gritted his teeth, and glowered at him, “That’s not funny, Dean.” Sam had yet to move his hand from Dean’s forehead. He needed the contact so he just stroked his fingers slowly back and forth. Dean closed his eyes and let Sam mother hen him. If it kept the kid happy then so was he. Ok, it felt good, and it was distraction from the pain tearing him apart, but he’d never admit that to Sam. “Ahh, come on, it was a little funny. Now are we gonna get on with it, bitch?” Dean’s voice wavered as he spoke.  
  
Sam straightened up and he took a deep breath. He saw Bobby move and looked at what he was holding out to him. It was a pair of tweezers. Sam swallowed, feeling sick, but he took them. “I’ve sterilized ‘em, and we got enough peroxide to bathe him in. Come on, Sam, we gotta get going. It ain’t gonna be pretty. But if you want Dean to be able to go through a security gate without setting off the metal detector, then we better get it all out.” Bobby moved to Dean’s shoulder, and prepared to start removing the buck shot.  
  
Sam decided to work on Dean’s leg. He placed his left hand on Dean’s leg and drew in a shaky breath. He felt Dean move as he looked up at him. Dean was smiling again, “Ain’t ya gonna finish the story for Bobby. I think he’d like to hear how you defeated Frankenkitty. Ahh shit.” Dean’s words were breathy, and Sam could see Bobby probing at the injuries on Dean’s arm.  
  
Sam picked up a cloth soaked with peroxide, gave his brother a silent apology for what he was about to do, then with a decisive move he wiped the area he was going to work on. Dean twisted his fingers in the sheet and his body arched up, his teeth gritted to stop him from screaming. Sam’s hand shook as he began to probe at one of the small wounds in Dean’s flesh. He found the tiny piece of metal, gripped it and slowly withdrew it. Then he wiped the wound again, as he moved onto the next one he started to talk.  
  
“Alright then, jerk. As I was saying, we found out that Sabrina might have just brought Fluffy back from the dead. We decided to check it out. We got to the farm and the place seemed quiet enough. No bodies or signs of black magic. We were just checking out the barn when...” Sam fell silent, he pulled another pellet free. He was trying to stop his hands from shaking, but he was having little success.  
  
He glanced up at Bobby; the older hunter’s face was a study in concentration, as he pulled yet another pellet from Dean’s left shoulder. Sam heard Dean’s breathing - it was slow and measured as Dean tried to keep himself under control, his eyes fixed firmly on the ceiling. Sam saw his fingers flex, as they gripped the sheet tightly and he knew that Dean was willing the pain away. Trying his best to keep his game face in place for Sammy. He swallowed and squared his shoulders; if Dean could do this, then he could continue with the story, only he stopped when a rough voice croaked out.  
  
“We were in the barn looking round, when Sam here gets struck in the chest by a guided missile of the moggy variety. Damn, Bobby, it was so fricking funny. Frankenkitty launched right at Sam and started to climb him like he was some sort of tree....Son of a bitch.” Dean hissed, as yet another pellet joined the growing collection in the bowl between Bobby and Sam.  
  
Dean managed to get himself back under control and carried on, “Jesus, Bobby, what ya diggin’ for - gold? So there’s Sam spinning round, arms flailing, so I can’t get a shot off. Finally after the thing’s been using him as a scratching post, Sam gets hold of it and pulls it off his chest. He holds it away from him, with his eight-foot long arms, tellin’ me to shoot it. I’m a good shot, but hell I wasn’t risking hitting Sam. I tell him to imagine he’s playing football again, and he throws it out of the barn.” Dean stopped speaking, and he grunted with pain as Sam dug into a wound over his hip. He swallowed convulsively, feeling sick as he felt the tweezers scrape against bone. Dean bit down on his lip, unable to continue speaking.  
  
Sam pulled the pellet free and picked up the tale again, “I threw the cat like it was a football, and the damn thing landed on its feet. It spun round and was hissing at us, looking like it was ready to rip someone’s throat out. You know, the funny thing was, Bobby, the way the kids had been talking I was expecting something as big as a mountain lion. Instead it was this scrappy, scrawny gray thing with one green eye and the other one, yellow. Bobby, by the looks of it, Sabrina had been stitching bits of the neighbourhood cats together to get the thing back on four feet. We got the feeling that it wasn’t the first time Frankenkitty had died. It was just this time there were witnesses, and now Frankenkitty and Sabrina were trying to get rid of ‘em. Dean took the shot - silver bullet right to the head, and then he went out to burn the damn thing.” At this point in the story, Bobby stood up, groaning, as his back complained at being hunched over as he worked on Dean.  
  
Bobby looked down at the man on the bed. Dean had closed his eyes tightly once more, and his lips were moving. He knew that Dean was going over the lyrics to his favourite songs; it was his way of dealing with pain when it got too bad. Bobby looked over at Sam, who looked up in concern. Bobby just gave a helpless shrug and a tired smile, “For god’s sake, Dean, just pass out, will ya.” He muttered under his breath, unable to take inflicting much more torture on Dean. Then he winced as Dean took a deep breath and then shivered; the sheet beneath him was slowly turning pink from the runoff of peroxide and the blood flowing down Dean’s body.  
  
Dean licked his lips. God, he was thirsty, and it felt like he was floating away, but he was trying to stay with Sam. He needed to stay with Sam, but he just wanted to drift off. It had gone quiet. Dean forced his eyes open and looked round the room, “Sammy, are you alright?” He sounded desperate. Sam was about to bitch Dean out for that, when he finally understood Dean’s constant need to know he was alright. It wasn’t his physical well-being he was concerned with, but his mental well-being - how he was holding up having to pull lumps of metal out of Dean’s body.  
  
Sam lowered his head then reached for Dean’s hand and squeezed gently, “I’m fine, Dean. Where was I? Right. Dean has just put Frankenkitty down and he was about to burn the remains. He was kneeling by it when he froze. Sabrina had turned up, and she wasn’t too pleased about what we’d done to her cat. Dean was trying to convince her to put down the shotgun, when I decided to walk out of the barn; I thought I could talk to her, Bobby.” Sam stopped as the scene played out in his mind.  
  
He’d walked out of the barn to try and talk to the girl about what she’d been doing; as he stepped out into her line of sight she had turned the shotgun on him. He’d probably never forget the look in her eyes; it was a mixture of anger, grief and shock at there being someone else there. In that second she had reflexively tightened her fingers on both triggers.  
  
The next thing Sam knew was Dean was slamming into him in a football tackle, throwing them both behind the barn door. The roar of the shotgun filled Sam’s ears, and he found himself on his back, with Dean lying on top of him, swearing. Sam had looked up and seen that the barn door had taken the force of the blast, but when he felt something warm seeping through his shirt he knew that Dean had been hurt. Sam had carefully rolled them both onto their sides, and he’d felt his heart plummet to his feet when he saw Dean bleeding. Then Dean had grabbed his hand, “Finish it, Sammy.” Then he’d pressed his lighter into Sam’s hand.  
  
Anger filled him and he got to his feet. He walked towards the pathetic corpse and saw the girl kneeling by it, sobbing, calling out softly to Fluffy. For once Sam couldn’t be sympathetic. Instead he flicked open the lighter, bent over, picked up the girl and pulled her away, before carelessly tossing the lighter onto the remains. She had snarled and spat at Sam as her beloved zombie cat had burnt, and finally sank back to her knees and started to cry. Sam had felt numb and for once he couldn’t spare the energy to be compassionate for the girl, weeping over her freak of Nature cat. Instead he ran back towards Dean, ignoring the pain in his chest and arms. When he’d reached him Dean was still lying on his side, panting and Sam hadn’t known where to start to try patching him up. Dean tried to sit up and Sam had got behind him and helped him up. Dean groaned softly and said, “Bobby’s...we gotta get to Bobby’s. Come on, bitch, help me up. You better not get any blood on my baby’s seats.” Then Sam had helped Dean towards the car. He’d had to find an old blanket to put over the seat at Dean’s insistence then he’d driven as if he was trying to outrun the apocalypse.  
  
When Sam came back to Bobby’s spare bedroom, he realized he’d stopped speaking. Now he sat there, shaking, holding Dean’s hand tightly while his other hand rested lightly on Dean’s stomach. He felt Dean’s stomach muscles flutter and twitch, as Bobby pulled yet more metal from out of his torn flesh.  
  
“Dean? God, Dean, are you alright?” Panic flooded through Sam when Dean didn’t respond. He stood up to see if Dean was ok. Relief washed over him when he realized that Dean was still breathing.  
  
“Thank God he finally passed out while you finished your story about your recent misadventure. You ok to carry on, Sam? Only the sooner we get this done the better. By the way, kid, don’t get blaming ya’self. Look, you two weren’t to know that she’d been using magic for years. I tell you what, Sam, while Dean’s resting up after this, me an’ you need to pay that place a little visit. And tell the good folks there we don’t take too kindly to seeing our family getting hurt. Now are we gonna stand here an’ get all Dr. Phil over this, or are we gonna finish helping ya brother?” Bobby gave Sam a warm smile, and Sam picked up the tweezers, cleaned them again and got back to his gruesome work.  
  
The room went silent, as he and Bobby worked methodically on removing the shot from Dean’s side. By the time Bobby had cleaned up Dean’s arm and torso, and Sam had gotten all the shot out of his leg, Dean was waking up again. He looked sick and disorientated. Sam leapt to his feet, and grabbed the trash can. He’d gotten behind Dean, pulling him up so he was resting against his chest. He held Dean while he’d thrown up everything he’d eaten in the last month by the looks of it. Finally Dean had slumped back against Sam, shivering violently. Once more Sam’s hand was resting on his brother’s stomach, and he gently massaged the cramping muscles beneath his fingers.  
  
Sam looked over at Bobby. He knew Dean couldn’t take much more of this. He was beyond pale now, his skin clammy and he was sweating. It looked like he was going into shock. “Can’t we give him anything at all? Please, Bobby, he needs something.” Sam was pleading with the older man. Bobby stepped back and took in the desperation in Sam’s voice and how ill Dean was looking. Bobby walked back to the med kit, and pulled out a small vial. He produced a syringe and drew some of the clear liquid into it.  
  
He walked back to the bed and Sam eased Dean’s right arm out straight, “What are you gonna give him, Bobby?”  
  
Bobby scratched at his beard and said, “Well, the local vet owes me a few favours for me cleaning out a real nasty poltergeist from his house. He supplies me with the odd animal antibiotic and painkiller from time to time. You ever seen your brother after he’s had Ketamin, Sam? Well, today’s your lucky day, kid. After his impressive exorcist impression just a minute ago, it should be safe to give him some now. I’m only giving him a fraction of the usual dose, but it should help him get some rest. Now all we gotta do is turn him into a mummy. I just hope I got enough bandages in.” Bobby swiftly slipped the needle into the crook of Dean’s elbow. There was a faint whimper of complaint from him as the needle went in.  
  
“Typical, bro, you barely make a sound while we operate on you without anaesthetic, but give you a little needle and you’d think it was the end of the world.” Sam stroked Dean’s arm as he spoke; he was then treated to a pair of unfocused green eyes looking up at him.  
  
Sam was startled when Dean smiled at him and tried to burrow closer to his body, sighing with contentment as he felt the warmth from Sam’s body. Sam looked up at Bobby in shock, only to see him grinning at him. “Oh, that ain’t nothing. Dean gets a little grabby on that stuff. You should’ve seen your dad’s face when Dean grabbed his ass and called him sweetheart. If he hadn’t been bleeding all over the place, I think ya dad would have performed an exorcism on principle.” Dean’s breathing was slowing, and he was getting heavier in Sam’s arms. He risked looking down to see his brother asleep in his arms with a happy and stoned smile back on his face. Sam couldn’t help the smile that appeared on his own face. Then he felt a pang of grief that Dean had been through hell before they could give him some relief from the pain.  
  
Sam eased Dean back down onto the bed, and moved away slowly so as not to disturb him. He walked around the bed to where Bobby was getting the bandages ready. Bobby passed Sam several bandages and they started to work again. They worked with a skill that spoke of the many times they were required to do this. First of all they covered the myriad of tiny wounds with antibiotic cream, before swathing Dean in bandages.  
  
As Sam bandaged his brother, he asked Bobby what had been playing on his mind, “Why did you have to give Dean Ketamin, Bobby? I don’t remember that hunt.”  
  
Bobby tied off a bandage and pushed his cap back on his head, “You were at Stanford, Sam, and John turned up here with Dean in a worse state than he is now. We patched him up, and the next morning ya dad was gone; he’d got a line on Ole Yellow Eyes. When he finally crawled back with his tail between his legs, I threatened him with my shotgun. Leaving Dean here out of his mind with fever. All he did was keep talking to you, kid. I learned more about you than I ever really needed to know. Then John turned up, got Dean and left. I miss ya dad, Sam, but there were times I could’ve rung the selfish son of a bitch’s neck. Ok, we’re done here, Sam; let’s get him in bed, and Sam, you might not want to turn ya back on ya brother for a while, unless you want a bruised ass while he calls ya darlin and thinks you’re some blonde waitress he wants to pick up.” Sam couldn’t help but laugh at that.  
  
Bobby took hold of the sheet and Sam picked Dean up carefully. The ruined sheet was pulled quickly away and Bobby turned back the bed clothes. Sam placed Dean back down on the bed, covering him up. Sam stroked at Dean’s forehead once more, and Dean turned into the touch. It was a gesture that nearly broke Sam’s heart. That Dean only allowed himself the luxury of physical affection when he was so injured or sick that his usual walls and defences were down.  
  
“Ok, Dean, you get some rest, and I’ll get you something to eat when you’re back with me, ok?” Sam was about to help Bobby with cleaning the room when Bobby pushed him down onto a chair by the bed.  
  
“Just sit with ya brother, Sam. Be with him when he wakes up; he don’t do too good with painkillers and you know it.” Sam nodded, acknowledging the truth in Bobby’s words. Dean hated the loss of control that being drugged meant. Sam reached out and rested his hand on Dean’s, and he relaxed his own battered body, determined to be there when Dean woke up. When he felt Dean’s fingers curl round his, Sam smiled at that. He couldn’t wait to see his normally stoic brother’s face when he woke up and realized he was holding Sam’s hand.  
  



End file.
